Ye Revel on Olympus.
Heap high the bowl! Ages ago
Before the birth of Faust or Hoe,
Before New Eras, Posts, and Suns
Gave specials, paragraphs and puns,
When only Mercury bore the news
Around the skies, in winged shoes,
Such genial revels held the gods,
Juno and Jove, and other frauds;
In heaven’s blue crystal urn each night
The stars, like berries, twinkled bright
And the Great Dipper skimmed the cream
Where poured the Milky Way its stream;
Deserted is the Olympic hill;
Heaven, stars, girls, strawberries, bless us still
Ye Invocation.
Lord, we adore thy matchless bounty
And grace which, after giving birth
To sun and moon and stars and earth.
Gave us a land of rarest worth
And cast our lot in Christian County!
’Mid meek-eyed Jerseys, guileless mules,
Hopkinsville peaches, Public Schools,
Tobacco farms and gilt-edged bonds,
Wheat-fields and sheep and fishing-ponds,
Coveys of quail and double barrels,
Opossums, pheasants, doves and squirrels,
Damsels whose pamphanescent eyes,
If stars were quenched would light the skies;
And for to-night, to make us merry,
Provided Izaak Walton’s berry,
Ten inches round in lawful measure,
The garden’s glory, pride and treasure—
Nor Brenner’s brush nor Prentice’s pen
Could tell their worth—and so, Amen!
Ye Picnic.
Fill high the bowl! In blissful vision
We wander over fields Elysian,
Through ever-lengthening colonnades,
Of whispering elms and beechen shades;
Grave manhood’s cares are cast away,
And all are boys again, to-day
By one sure sign we know each other—
“The strawberry mark!—Our long lost brother!”
While all discourse on sylvan pipe
Of golden cream and berries ripe,
Or sound on Memory’s silver horn,
“I too was in Arcadia born!”
Sooth, ’tis a goodly sight to see
The revellers’ mutual ministry:
Stanton shall drive the Jersey cow,
Sam Gaines shall cause her milk to flow,
Logan shall hold her by the tail,
And Kelly bear the foaming pail;
Woodson shall crush the crystal ice,
Johnston hand spoons, all polished nice,
The Courier-Journal pass the berries,
With brisk champagne and golden sherries
And he shall serve his country best
Who stores most berries ’neath his vest.
By shady glen and waterfall
Our early loves will we recall,
Maids whom no time can ere eclipse,
With strawberry cheeks and sugared lips,
Phantoms which haunt boyhood’s dream,
Life’s fragrant, pure crême de la crême—
Delicious cream, which soured too soon,
And left us with an empty spoon!
Ye Pioneer’s Wild Strawberries.
Master of the Feast:
“Father, thy locks are thin and gray,
Hast thou no legend for us pray?
Sing of the wild strawberry’s flame
When first Kentucky hunters came.”
Old Pioneer: